Resources

(This list is growing fast! Please check back soon for more links, or write kate@prosocialpower.org. Organizations with a * are located in Chicago, or have local chapters in Chicago.)

Tools for Building Transformative Movements

Beautiful Solutions From worker-owned cooperatives to participatory budgeting, time banking, and partiipatory democaracy, Beautiful Solutions "gathers the most promising and contagious strategies for building a more just, democratic, and resilient world."

The Alliance to Reclaim Our Schools “A national alliance of parent, youth and community organizations and labor groups fighting for educational justice and equity in access to school resources and opportunities.”

Hand in Hand“A national network of employers of nannies, housecleaners and home attendants working for dignified and respectful working conditions that benefit the employer and worker alike.” They sponsor the Fair Care Pledge to help employers promise to pay fair wages.

*Grassroots Illinois Action works "to unite Chicagoans in an effort to build real independent political power in and for our communities." Join the mailing list to participate in meetings, canvassing, and actions to connect the dots between education justice, affordable housing, progressive taxation & more.

*Lifted Voices"is an action oriented organization aimed at defending the lives and rights of women and non binary people of color. Through direct action, community dialogue and self defense curriculums, we seek to empower and protect ourselves, and one another."

*People's Response Team "is a multi-racial, intergenerational group committed to supporting efforts to end police violence in Chicago."

*Project NIA's "mission is to dramatically reduce the reliance on arrest, detention, and incarceration for addressing youth crime and to instead promote the use of restorative and transformative practices."

*SURJ (Showing Up for Racial Justice)has 100+ chapters around the country to organize primarily (but not exclusively) white people to educate one another about racial justice and support actions for liberation led by people of color.

​The PIC is...An online 'zine about the prison industrial complex, and why dismantling it is so important to racial and education justice

Prison Culture Veteran organizer Mariame Kaba describes her blog as "a running work journal; a place to catalogue all of the ideas, thoughts, musings, and resources that I have about mass incarceration, transformative justice and the prison industrial complex (PIC)." It's also a great resource for budding organizers, and folks looking for ways to resist the Trump agenda.

Revolutionary Mothering: Love on the Frontlines, Edited by Alexis Pauline Gumbs, China Martens, and Mai’a Williams "None of us are here unless we are mothered. We are mothered by our movements, our families of origin and chosen family configurations and we all still struggle to mother ourselves and each other. Turning to visionary mothers from the 1970s to today as guideposts, Revolutionary Mothering activates mothering as the answer to the key questions for our species: (How) will we continue to exist? How do we imagine a future beyond ourselves? How do we relate to resources and time in a life-giving, life-renewing way, for real?"

How to Understand Power - a 7-minute video with Eric Liu, founder of Citizen University. "Power is no more inherently good or bad than fire, or physics. It just is... Learning how power operates is key to being effective and being taken seriously."

What Teachers Make This explosive 3-minute poem by Taylor Mali may inspire you to reframe your life's work as having far more value than society gives you credit for.

Wretches and JabberersMany autistic people are not "nonverbal" at all, when they have the right technological supports. Watch them travel the world, arranging cross-cultural meetings and typing out incredible insights on their devices.